With the competition just around the corner, Nick Chapman was lifting some light loads this week at the Amherst Powerlifting Club in preparation for the Autumn Armageddon powerlifting competition Saturday at the Amherst Wandlyn Inn.

AMHERST - Humans usually resort to using forklifts when they have heavy loads to lift, but powerlifters aren't like that.

"There's some strong boys coming on Saturday," said Nathan Robertson, trainer at the Amherst Powerlifting Club. "With some of the guy we're probably looking at a 900-plus pounds on the squat, 600-plus on the bench, and 700-plus on the deadlift."

Powerlifters from throughout Eastern Canada and a few from Maine will be in Amherst Saturday for the 2013 Autumn Armageddon Powerlifting competition.

"We have a total of 35 lifters," said Robertson. "They're coming from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I., and there's a bunch from Quebec and a couple from Maine."

Five of the powerlifters will be from the Amherst club.

"Everybody is improving," said Robertson.

Making progress is what powerlifting is all about.

"If someone's not making progress there is something wrong and we change their training program," said Robertson. "Nobody gets stuck in a rut for long. We find what the problem is and fine tune their workouts."

One girl from the club will be competing on Saturday.

"We have five girls training here now and they're doing excellent," said Robertson. "We started out with one or two and now we have five. They train with us and then they do their own thing together."

The Armageddon tournament is a warm-up to a competition in New York in November.

"It's the IPA Long Island Fall Fest," said Robertson. "It's a different federation than ours but it's similar."

With the competition just around the corner, Nick Chapman was lifting some light loads this week at the Amherst Powerlifting Club in preparation for the Autumn Armageddon powerlifting competition Saturday at the Amherst Wandlyn Inn.